


Lasting Impressions

by cougarlips



Series: Athletes AU // TLoK [2]
Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: Asami's POV, F/F, Korra's POV, POV First Person, it switches midway
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-03
Updated: 2016-03-03
Packaged: 2018-05-23 21:02:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 685
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6129974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cougarlips/pseuds/cougarlips
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>She arrived in sweatpants and a racerback, emphasizing her broad shoulders and just how tiny she was. For a moment, I was stunned at how serious she looked, with her bob still damp from an early shower and her “I own the world” strut -- until she saw me, grinned, and flexed her arms, tripping over her the lip of the doorway in her distraction.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lasting Impressions

With an uncontrollable fluttering in my chest, I invited Korra to meet me for a ballet rehearsal. (“You said you’re practicing so you can learn to be more fluid, right? Well, I have to do the same thing. You should come with me.”)

She arrived in sweatpants and a racerback, emphasizing her broad shoulders and just how tiny she was. For a moment, I was stunned at how serious she looked, with her bob still damp from an early shower and her “I own the world” strut -- until she saw me, grinned, and flexed her arms, tripping over her the lip of the doorway in her distraction.

We started with pair stretches: sitting on the floor with our feet pressed together, pulling and stretching each other over our legs until our chests bumped into our knees. Korra’s hands were warm and dry, chapped against my own, an attribute she told me came from the culmination of sweat and chalk for hours a day, nearly every day since she could walk.

And somehow, in the midst of our warm-ups, I forgot about the anxiety bubbling inside my stomach, the nervousness that encompassed me when I thought about Korra Takotna, the Beautiful. Korra Takotna, the Gymnast. This was Korra Takotna, the Goofball, and her smile was crooked from a broken jaw when she took up boxing, her legs longer than she knew what to do with from a growth spurt when she tore her ACL, her laughter so deep that she snorted every time.

In time, the rehearsal strayed further and further away from any legitimate practice, and it turned more and more into a Girls Day. That isn’t to say no progress was made, but the initial goal of stressing gracefulness and fluidity was lost. Korra tried to prove she was more flexible, while I -- albeit, at first, unwillingly -- proved that my balance was superior. She grinned and chuckled, snorted and choked on her laughter when she watched me try and outlast her in a handstand contest, falling only seconds after me because she couldn’t hold herself together.

We finally parted ways after we were simply too exhausted to keep going, and I went home and collapsed in my bed, still wearing my leotard and tights, Korra’s laughter echoing throughout my head.

* * *

She was grace and elegance all wrapped up in form-fitting dresses and heavy bladed boots. She exuded brilliance with every spin, every smile, every breath that left her mouth and every translucent puff of air that swirled around her head in the cold arena.

When she practiced, she held her head high and stuck her chest out: “I am a queen,” she seemed to say. “I am _the_ queen.” When she fell, she nodded, recognized what she did wrong, got back up, and she never made the same mistake again. Her patience was as strong as her body was, it appeared.

And yet as regal as she was in the rink, as poised and fluid on frozen ice balanced on only two blades as she was, she was just as adept on solid earth. Her chest to the sky, she glided as easily on the ground as she did in the rink. She stood tall and sure, rock solid in her composure.

She was talented in everything, it seemed, but she did have at least one major fault: keeping her interests -- and her dorkiness -- at bay. She relished in the drama of Romeo and Juliet-style rom-coms, but her true guilty pleasure lied in her love for any variant of the classic Cinderella. I fought the urge to laugh at her anytime she cried as Cinderella’s dress was ruined, or as Cinderella’s night was sabotaged, or as Cinderella’s Happy Ending was compromised by the wicked step-mother no matter how many times she’d seen the movie at hand, but the passion in her eyes and the splotchiness of her cheeks knocked any vindictive humor right out of me, and then I had to fight the urge to grab onto her and hold her tight, to press kisses to her forehead until she smiled one more time.

**Author's Note:**

> this is gonna be an ongoing AU, but don't ask me how many parts i'm going to have bc i have no idea :') i'm _aiming_ for three, but that isn't set in stone. if you read part 1 of this series ("The Three Times I Saw Her"), you know form my notes there that I have a WIP AU for korrasami, but i've since decided to mash it in with this AU. that said, this may turn into something akin to a chapter fic, but as it stands it can all be read individually.
> 
> also!!! i'd like to say thank you to everyone who has commented, bookmarked, kudo'd, and shared part 1!!!! i'll be honest, i've been writing and posting fanfiction for well over six years now and i've gotten more feedback in ~week it's been posted than any other piece i've ever shared. so to all of you who requested additional pieces for this AU, here you go u3u


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